I got the all clear from a health check that, I confess, had me a little worried.
A colleague (younger than I) tragically lost a member of his peer group to illlness.
A very dear friend has had to call off, due to being in hospital, awaiting results.
I watch the latest episode of a fantasy series I’m following: This one is about death…
It has been a week to contemplate ones mortality. But it need not be a maudlin reflection, we are, all, only here for a short while, and however much we choose to deny, everyone will eventually “shuffle off this mortal coil” “meet their maker” ” run up the curtain and join the choir invisible” (add your euphamism of choice).
““… when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” Samuel Johnston (I knew the quote, but I did have to check the atribution).
Hopefully I (and all of you) have rather more than a fortnight, but (I think) the concept is valid anytime you must acknowledge that your life is finite. Questions arise unbidden about what kind of life you have lived, how you might be remembered, whether you might still have time to be be a “better” partner/parent/you?
There is also the intevitable maths of our years which makes certain goals, shall we say, less likely – for example; I now likely do own more games than I will ever be able to play – empty words which have followed me some years, but which I must now recognise hold at least some truth.
But, if that thought means either I become more discriminating about the time I spend on that hobby, or that I must double down and spend much more focus if I am to play every game, surely that is a good thing?
Of course my collection of games is a flippant example, but as I queue up to join the rush into my seventh decade, there are certainly people in my life who deserve either that more discriminating time, or the effort to have more time, or likely both.
Dying? that’s the last thing I want to do, but Living, it’s important to remember to do that too.
Next week on IaDL : Fare faw yer honest sonsie face…
Dalmallyfest the Asylum 